St Louis

Sunday 27 April 2008

Well, I started off with good intentions of ‘touring St Louis’ but by the time I woke up and muddled around doing ‘stuff’, it was lunch time. Jill and I decided to catch a taxi to the Gateway Arch to see what it was all about. It is an amazing structure completed in 1965, made of stainless steel and located in the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial park. You can ride up to the top in a 5 person pod they call a “tram”. It’s not good if you’re claustrophobic but it only takes 4 minutes to get to the top, which would be a problem if you didn’t have a head for heights as it’s 192m or 630ft high. However, you do get a cracking good view! Directly below is the historic Old Courthouse which is renowned for a ruling passed on Dred Scott, a slave who asked for his freedom but was ultimately denied. There also just happened to be a big baseball game on, so that made for an interesting photo of the stadium. Unfortunately, there are a number of steps up here and down there to get to the trams, so Jill wasn’t able to see the view. So while I was up the top, she went to see a documentary on the building of the Gateway Arch and wandered around the museum.

By time we left, it had started to drizzle slightly so we found a taxi to take back to the hotel where we had about 45 minutes to ‘relax’ before heading downtown again to a cocktail party that Joan Headley had arranged in our honour. Our hosts were Art and Gayla Hoffman who have a lovely ‘condo’ on the 14th floor filled with interesting artwork and boasting gorgeous views across various parts of St Louis. We were joined by Dr Martin Wice, a Physiatrist (rehabilitation specialist) who sits on the Board of Post Polio Health International; Penny, a previous Member of the Board; and Joan’s brother, Jim and his wife Judy. It was a very civilised way to spend the evening and we really appreciated the effort people went to on our behalf.

Tomorrow we have an ‘official’ meeting with Joan Headley at Post Polio Health International (www.post-polio.org) which I plan to video, before meeting with a team at Paraquad Independent Living Center. It will be very interesting to compare services.